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Soccer drills for high school

These soccer drills for high school will help ensure your players are well prepared for particular game situations. Defensive positioning, winning the ball in midfield and finding space in attack are all covered in this section, with the drills suitable for U14s and upwards. Print them out and use them at your high school coaching sessions. Click on the headings below.

Soccer drills to help goalies stop a high cross – Corners, free-kicks and crosses can cause chaos if your goalkeeper doesn’t jump high and catch the ball. Use the following soccer goalie drills and tips to sharpen your goalie’s skills.

Soccer coaching tips to help goalies read penalties – Seventy per cent of the penalty kicks at the last World Cup went to the opposite side of the foot the kicker took the penalty with. If professionals make that choice, then how much more likely are young players to do so? Use the following soccer coaching tips to get goalies prepared for penalties.

Kick off tactics to keep opponents guessing – Kick-offs are particularly important in junior soccer because if you’ve just given away a goal, or you are starting the first or second half of a match, you need your players to take the initiative. Use these kick-off soccer coaching tips and tactics to catch your opponents out.

Tackle techniques to wrong foot opponent – Quick-footed attackers look great when they run at defenders and leave them tackling thin air. You can coach your players how to do this and give them the confidence to go on match-winning runs.

Three way soccer drill for goalie and striker skills – Strikers and goalkeepers work well together in threes. This quick, shooting soccer drill keeps your goalkeeper on his toes and helps your strikers find the best place to put their shots to beat the opposition keeper.

Soccer drill for defending deep – The Italian national team has grown up on the defensive system called Catenaccio – in which the teams strangle the game then unleash long counter-attacking balls. The team’s ability to defend deep is a useful skill for youth soccer (football). Use this soccer drill to teach your players these tips and tactics.

Defensive skills drill using players to coach the team – In this basic soccer training drill, one of the players becomes the “coach” and instructs the team in the tactics to use in a 3v3 game. Watching play from the sidelines is different to playing in the game and it can help players develop tactical ability if they’re not in the thick of things.

Soccer drill to brush up goalkeeper distribution – One of the most surprising statistics I have seen is that passes by the goalkeeper fall in the highest bracket of overall pass rate success. So make the most of your goalie by incorporating a soccer drill to work on these skills into your training sessions.

Soccer drill to get your back up defenders in the right place – When a defender is applying pressure to an attacker with the ball it’s important they have back-up in the form of a second or “covering” defender. That’s to ensure that if the attacker beats the first defender, any progress is stifled by the second one. Use these tips and drills to coach back-up skills

Attack skills game – There will always be situations in soccer matches where a lone attacker faces two defenders, but using this attack game in your soccer training drill sessions can build the skills to help your players give a good account of themselves.

Soccer drill for overload situations – Attacking against different numbers of defenders means the difficulty level of this soccer drill is changing each time a goal is scored. For the defence, the ability to anticipate and dictate the passage of play is necessary in order to win the ball when the odds are stacked against them.

Soccer attack drill for the way players are facing – Attackers don’t always need to try to turn and beat defenders when they get the ball with their back to goal. A good tip is to get your players varying their tactics. Follow this soccer drill for an alternative approach.

Help your attackers when their back is to the goal – Follow these soccer coaching tips and drills to improve your attackers’ understanding and skills when their backs are to goal. It is a skill in itself being able to turn or move the ball into space without having the luxury of seeing where all the defenders and the goalkeeper are.

Soccer coaching tips to make throw ins attacking – Throw-ins in the attacking third of the field are more than just a way of re-starting play, they’re also a means of launching attacks. Coach your players to make the most of them with the following soccer drills.

Soccer drill to boost striker skills and awareness – Strikers find themselves in all sorts of situations during a game, so you have to coach them in training drill sessions to prepare them for what they will face. Try this soccer drill to help players become more aware of what is going on around them and able to react at full speed and intensity.

Small sided game to get midfielders linking defence with attack -The midfield is the engine room of your football team, it makes everything else tick. The following soccer coaching tips and small sided game should help link your defenders to your attackers, so when the defence clears the ball into midfield it is moved quickly on to the attackers to fire at the goal.

Coach players to defend long ball over the top of their heads – I find it hard to accept when we let in a goal in the last 10 minutes – especially if it’s a goal that turns a win into a draw or a draw into a loss.Tired players are often caught upfield by swift counter-attacks that destroy all the tactical planning and good skills in the rest of the game. Coach your players in a recovery plan move to handle this situation.

Soccer drill to get players marking tight – If I ask one of my players to mark an opponent tightly, he needs to know what I mean by “tight.” Putting it simply, he is guarding an opponent so it is difficult for them to receive the ball or play and easily pass to a team mate. To practise these skills, get your players to try the following simple soccer drill.

Soccer drill to coach blocking the shot – Defenders can save goals by placing themselves between the goal and the ball. Some defenders have the ability to read the situation and will “throw” themselves in front of the ball to deflect it away from goal. The following soccer drill is a good one to get defenders blocking shots to protect the goal and working at match speed to make their reactions fast and instinctive.

Soccer drill session for defending in threes – Building a good understanding between defenders is important to the success of your team. What this soccer coaching drill aims to do is to develop your players’ appreciation of the positions they must take up relative to each other, the attacker and the ball.

Soccer drill to get players defending long throw ins – Long throw-ins have become fashionable in youth soccer, where they are about as effective as having free-kicks or corners, especially if they’re near the goal. To defend against them, you need a basic set up with players aware of their responsibilities when the ball is played in. Use this soccer drill to get your players working on these skills.

Muddy pitch warm up drill for goalkeepers – If the pitch is muddy, use this soccer drill to warm-up your goalie’s feet as well as their hands because in these conditions it is the goalkeeper’s footwork that will often be the deciding factor when the ball is played.

Soccer drill to get lone defenders delaying attack – Delaying an attack is vital when defenders are on their own at the back, waiting for reinforcements to arrive. So use this soccer drill to show your defenders how they can hold off attackers by pressuring quickly and keeping them away from goal.

Soccer coaching tips for midfielders – You often find in youth soccer that one of the most active roles on the pitch is playing in midfield and that these players need high levels of concentration to do the job. Use the following soccer coaching tips to help your players.

Soccer drill to defend against midfield passing – Stopping opposition midfielders from passing through balls to their attackers is a vital part of a team’s defense skills. In this soccer drill session, the nearest midfield player must pressure the ball while the others stop a forward pass.

How to become a soccer coach – It is estimated that there are currently more that 8200 youth soccer clubs in the U.S. US Youth Soccer has over 300,000 registered coaches, the majority of whom are volunteers, to coach 3,000,000 registered youth players (ages 5-19).

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